(a) Field of the Invention
This invention generally relates to a device for cutting items into generally cubical shapes. More particularly, but not by way of limitation, to a device that cuts food items into generally cubical shapes.
(b) Discussion of Known Art
The need for a device that can make cubes, or cut generally cubical portions, of food items such as cheese, vegetables, and the like has long been known. Devices that are used to carry out this task of cutting food items into cubed sections have been developed, but suffer from the limitation that they either require a great deal of force to operate, and thus require some sort of motorized drive mechanism, or involve the inefficient use of drive shafts that transmit power from a power input crank, around the item being cut, and then to the cutting blades. These designs are adequate for manufacture from machined metal components, but do not lend themselves to production from molded polymer plastic materials. Thus known designs do not lend themselves to the efficiencies and the per-unit cost savings that can be achieved through high-volume molded polymer plastic fabrication.
The Dynamic Company of Quebec City, Quebec, Canada, distributes a food-dicing device under the trademark Dynacube, which includes a chute for accepting the food item to be processed, and a pestle that is used to push the food item into the chute while cutting blades are inside the device cut the food item in a longitudinal and transverse direction. A significant shortcoming of this type of device is that the rate of advancement of the food item through the device depends on the user's physical ability to press the food item against the longitudinal cutting blades and to advance the food item at a constant rate, in order to produce cut items of uniform shapes.